Patching the Teamwork Picture Together, Nairobi Day 2

Evans and Carter

Today I got to see more fully how the teamwork happens for this trip. Carter Via arrived today, the man who founded Cross Cultural Thresholds in New York, the man who hired me to come. We met with Agnes Musau and her team. I told Agnes’ story briefly in my blog yesterday. The meeting began with the principal of the school, Evans, saying a sweet prayer. Then Agnes read a passage from 1 Corinthians where St. Paul says one person plants the seed, Apollo waters the seed, but it is God who makes the plant grow. Agnes explained she feels she planted the seed of the orphanage, that Carter has come to water the seeds, but it is God who makes the plants grow. She was so clear. Not overly pious, she just gets it.

Carter works with his foundation at home to raise funds that contribute to building and assisting the orphanage, then brings teams of people over two or three times a year to help with all sorts of projects. This trip they are planning to start the building of a dormitory. Some of the children Agnes’s organization feeds, educates and defends still live in their homes under various conditions of poverty and sometimes abuse, but others have nowhere to live, thus there is a need for a dormitory to house them. Carter listened to the other hopes and plans Agnes and her staff have in mind to utilize the help from the 30 people who are arriving tomorrow.

As much as survival is the necessity and the motive for most of the work, I was moved to hear of Carter’s vision and that of those who he is bringing. He wants to provide gloves and plastic bags for the kids and team members to go out into the Kabira neighborhoods and start bagging trash as much as possible. They may barely put a dent in the situation but the hope is to show others in the slum that this group is here to help the kids but also to try to contribute whatever else needs to be done in the area. And this helps the kids see themselves as responsible to their larger community. Similarly, one of the women coming is a musician who has plans to work with the children in making instruments and teaching them songs. Her idea is to have the kids make two instruments each, one for themselves and one to send back to a school in New York where she works, one that is also in need of instruments.

I won’t go on and on, though I could. I heard the story of a man who contributed the funds to build the dormitory in honor of his two-year old daughter who died. The dorm will be named after her. Another woman petitioned for a grant from company at home for money with which to buy a plot of land where Agnes’s group can plant food to help feed the children. The kids will help in the garden, see where their food comes from, and participate in their own survival this way. She got the grant and that plot of land was purchased just today. Other such stories seem plentiful.